


Song of Us

by Winmance



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Composer Damen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internet Famous, M/M, Singer Laurent, working together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-22
Packaged: 2021-02-24 15:26:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21900130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winmance/pseuds/Winmance
Summary: Damen is a famous composer who really wants Laurent, a faceless internet singer with a rabid speculating internet cult followers, to sing his new song. Laurent has to be convinced to meet Damen, as well as being in the mainstream spotlight instead of his corner of the internet.
Relationships: Damen/Laurent (Captive Prince)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 161
Collections: Captive Prince Reverse Bang 2019





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This work was a colloboration with the very talented [bloomejasmine](https://bloomejasmine.tumblr.com) , don't forget to check out her art [here](https://bloomejasmine.tumblr.com/post/189807430775/my-capri-bigbang2k19-pieces-with-the-fic-from-the) ! Thank you for working on this with me.
> 
> Also a big thank you to [readerwriteme](https://www.tumblr.com/safe-mode?url=https%3A%2F%2Freaderwriterme.tumblr.com%2F), who beta all of this. 
> 
> Enjoy !

[](https://ibb.co/ZdyyLvt)

Damen was in the record company office, the very same one he was in when they’d first shown interest in him years ago. Funnily enough, he was as stressed now as he’d been back then.

It was never a good sign when the big boss asked someone to come to his office. Most of the time it meant they’d be thanked for their services and asked to leave the building.

Damen knew he wouldn’t be fired. The last ten albums he’d written had ended up being big hits, and he even helped discover two of their biggest artists. Nope, as a household name in the music industry, he knew there wasn’t even the slightest chance he’d be out, and logically, he had no reason to be stressed; yet, he couldn’t help the growing ball of anxiety inside his stomach.

“Damen!” Halvik said as she entered her office. “Thanks for coming.”

“No problem, it sounded quite urgent.”

“Ah, yes,” Halvik sighed and her expression turned serious. Damen hated that expression. “See, we have… an issue. It’s about the new album you wrote.”

“What’s up with it?”

“Well, you turned down every artist we presented you,” Halvik said awkwardly. “We’ve discussed it with the staff, and we thought that maybe you should be in charge of finding your own singer.”

“How do you expect me to do that? It’s not my job!”

“I know, I know, and I’ve told them so, but they won’t listen. You have a talent for making people shine. Of course, we’ll help you. I’m will send you a list of people we’ve pre-selected, but you’re free to look elsewhere too.”

Damen sighed, knowing that there was no way he was getting out of this. Really, he only had himself to blame; they’d asked him to pick a singer two months ago and he’d turned everyone down. 

“How long do I have?”

“One week to find him and one month to send us the first demo.”

“One week? I can’t find someone in a week! Let alone make something worth listening to in a month!”

“Sorry Damen, I’m just the messenger,” Halvik said. “Of course, you could ask Nikandros to help you. I know you two like working together.”

“Awesome,” he said ironically.

“Glad you’re taking this so well. We’ll see each other in a week, then.”

Damen sighed and left the office. How was he supposed to find someone halfway decent in so little time?

“Damen, are you listening?”

“Uh? Oh, yeah, yeah. Definitely.”

Nikandros sighed heavily and dropped himself into the chair in front of Damen.

They’d been trying to find a new artist for two days now, but none of the ones on Halvik’s list were to his liking. He needed something new, something fresh. All those artists sounded the same. They were just copy-pasted versions of the current trending singers and Damen was not interested in that.

“Come on dude, help out a little bit at least. You do know you’re the one that’s supposed to be making a decision, right?”

“I know, it’s just… I don’t like them. They’re not… it’s not what I’m looking for. Hell, most of them are only famous because they’re super-hot or they’re related to someone on staff at the label. They’re talented enough, but I want more. If I’m gonna choose someone, I need to believe in them completely.”

“Ok, so? What do you want to do?”

He hesitated for a moment before speaking.

“I want to find someone else, someone who can sing the songs I’ve written and put actual emotions into them.”

“Like what…a fan?”

“Not necessarily,” he sighed, “I just want to keep things real and maybe give someone the chance I was given.”

Nikandros seemed to think about it for a moment before nodding. “Alright. We can do that.”

“We can?” Damen asked, surprised.

“Yeah. I think it’s a great idea!”

Damen couldn’t help but smile, Nikandros was one of Imagine Records’ best musicians and Damen’s best friend. They’d both demo’d for Imagine Records at the same time and made it a point of honor to be able to work together. 

“Did you already have someone in mind?”

“No,” he admitted. 

“I really do have to do everything around here, don’t I?” he joked as he started playing a song on his phone. “Come on, we have a ton of music to listen to.”

Finding fan covers of his songs wasn’t a hard task and Nikandros kept them coming while making sure to add the ones they liked the most to his playlist. It was no surprise that most of the covers were of his two biggest hits and that there were only a few that weren’t.

He couldn’t really say it bothered him; he understood why they’d chosen the songs they had, but sometimes he wished his fans would cover the other songs, the ones that truly meant something to him. He loved every single one of his songs, of course, but some were deeper than others. Still, he appreciated each one of them and made sure to write down everything he liked and disliked about each cover.

They had listened to approximatively fifty different covers when Nikandros finally begged for a break.

“Please, tell me you found someone,” he told him, looking over Damen’s notes.

“No,” he sighed. He hadn’t thought it would be so hard.

Most of the people they’d heard were good, some extremely good even, but none of them were what he was looking for. He wanted something deep, a voice so full of emotions that it would leave people shaking. 

“Maybe this was a bad idea,” he finally said.

“Hey, come on, this was your idea!” Nikandros said, “And it was a great idea, so we’re gonna listen to a few more and we’ll find what you’re looking for.”

Damen sighed but put back the music on, only half-listening to it now.

Kastor always said he made things too complicated when there was no reason too. Maybe he was right. Something that should only have taken about half a day was now rolling into two whole days because of him.

Another song began, and he recognized it right away. _Tired Of Heaven_ , one of his lesser-known songs, but one of his favorites. He’d written it after his father had died and it was added to an album as a bonus track. His fans had loved it, but it was too far removed from his usual cheerful songs to make an appearance on the radio, but here was the voice of an angel singing it. There was no other way to describe it. It was soft and almost delicate, like a whisper in his ear, yet so powerful that every single hair on his body stood up.

“Him,” he simply said. “He’s the one.”

After a quick look over Damen’s phone to see the artist’s name, Nikandros took his own phone and started typing on it, the music still playing and filling the room. Damen closed his eyes, his body transported by the beauty of the voice.

He could already imagine the song he would ask him to sing, all the emotions that would come out. It was the perfect match.

“He has no face,” Nikandros said.

“What?”

“I mean that all his videos are completely black or with aesthetic pictures.”

“Did you try Instagram?”

“Well, he has pictures, sure, but not of his face. Apparently, he refuses to show himself.”

Nikandros closed his computer with a sigh and rubbed his face.

Damen, more optimistic, took his phone and began searching for Lamagician’s Instagram. Once he found it, he quickly wrote a DM and sent it immediately.

“What are you doing?” Nikandros asked.

“I sent him a DM. I told him I wanted to make a collaboration with him and that we will be waiting for his answer.”

“I don’t think he’ll answer. Did you read the video description? He says that his fans had requested for him to sing one of your songs. He hasn’t done any other of your covers.”

“And? It doesn’t mean he doesn’t like my music.”

No one ever claimed not to like one of his songs before. Sure, it wasn’t always everyone's taste, but they could all admit that they were good songs. He didn’t see why that wouldn’t be true in Lamagician’s case.

“No, but it means that he may not be interested. Out of all your hits, he chose this one, so there’s a good chance he doesn’t like the rest of your music.”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out, isn’t there?”

“I guess so,” Nikandros mumbled. “We should look for someone else, just in case.”

“We will,” he said, getting up from his chair. “But first, we need to get out of this room and grab a real coffee. Maybe some food, too.”

“You know,” Nikandros started, “The guy has quite the reputation. He has a huge cult underground fanbase.”

I don’t understand why he doesn’t show his face, through”

“Maybe he’s ugly?”

“That’s what they all said. Can you imagine? Having such a delicate voice and looking like… I don’t know, Frankenstein’s monster.”

Damen laughed before turning toward Nikandros.

“So, still prettier than you?”

The punch to the shoulder was expected and only made him laugh louder.

“I want muffins,” Nikandros said when they entered the mall. “And a black coffee.”

“Muffins sound good.”

They only had to wait a few minutes before their order was ready since the coffee shop was almost empty.

While Nikandros grabbed the bag of muffins, he grabbed the drinks, but he must have turned too fast because the next thing he knew, the cups he was holding slipped through his fingers and ended up on the poor guy behind him. He grimaced and silently thanked Nikandros for changing his mind and making them order iced tea instead of coffee.

“Shit, I’m so sorry,” he apologized, handing a stack of napkins to the stranger.

His coat was soaked with iced tea and the napkins weren’t helping at all, if anything, they were only making the man angrier.

He wanted to apologize again, but as soon as he glimpsed the stranger’s face, all his words got stuck in his throat.

Beautiful. There was no other word to describe him. He had long, blond hair; perfect apart from the tea dripping from the ends. His traits were soft like a doll and Damen had to prevent himself from reaching out to touch him. He was the most accurate version of what an angel would look like. Well, a very angry, bitchy angel, anyway.

“It’s completely ruined! Couldn’t you-“

The man stopped dead in his tracks as soon as he saw him. The anger from earlier gone, replaced by surprise first, then another expression that Damen couldn’t quite place. It wasn’t excitement or happiness like he usually got when people recognized him, it was something else, something bad.

“I can pay for the dry cleaning,” he offered. The stranger’s eyes were blue. A beautiful, dark shade of blue that made Damen’s head dizzy for a moment.

“No, forget it. I’ll take care of it myself.”

Before he could say anything else, the man was gone.

“Jeez, what’s his problem?” Nikandros asked. “You didn’t do it on purpose.”

“I don’t know,” Damen admitted, still confused about what just happened.

It was strange. He had the feeling he’d met the man somewhere, but he couldn’t quite remember – there was no way he would have forgotten that face – but he could distinctly remember his voice.

“I think I know him.”

Nikandros rolled his eyes as he ordered two new teas.

“Blond, blue eyes, pretty, yeah, I think you probably saw him in one of your wet dreams.”

Well, he couldn’t deny that and he didn’t even try to defend himself, knowing that there wasn’t any logical explanation he could give without Nikandros telling him to stop thinking with his dick.

When they finally got back to Damen’s house and dropped into their original positions, Damen on his bed, face down, and Nikandros on a chair, they started picking through music again, though neither were really listening at this point. After a while, every voice sounded like the others.

Without realizing it, Damen started to think about the stranger he’d met earlier. He was so beautiful, the kind of beauty you only see once in a lifetime. Nikandros was probably right though, he only thought he knew the guy because he was ticking all his boxes.

Still, he swore he recognized him from somewhere.

“Could you pull up another video of Lamagician?” Damen asked. “I want to hear more of him.”

“Sure.”

A new song started, and Damen let his mind wander. The song was called Lamagician. It was a love song, like most songs, and he remembered listening to it with Jokase. He could picture her, walking through Paris with him, kissing him under the stars and making love in the back seat of a car. It was the most cliché thing ever, but it always filled him with happiness.

He wondered if Jokase was already picturing Kastor at that time.

The rhythm of the song slowed, and something clicked in Damen’s mind. He took the phone from Nikandros’ hands and played the same part again.

“What? Did you hear something?”

“Dude! It’s him!” Damen excitedly said.

“What? Who?”

“The guy from the coffee shop! He’s Lamagician!”

Nikandros looked at him as if he had grown a second head and stopped the music.

“There’s no way you were able to recognize his voice.”

“Of course, I can recognize his voice!” he said, offended.

“No, your voice when you sing and when you talk are completely different! There’s no way you could recognize him!”

“Have I ever been wrong about something like this before?”

For a moment, Nikandros was quiet. Damen had perfect pitch, which, on top of making him a good musician, also made him capable of recognizing voices he’d already heard.

“Alright, let’s say it was him. What does that change?”

Damen sighed in relief. He knew he could count on Nikandros.

“We could go back to the coffee shop. They must have written his name on his cup, so that would be a start.”

“Yeah, but you’re forgetting a few things: first, there’s no way they would give you is name and two, a really clumsy man dropped a tea on him before he was able to order.”

“Shit,” he sighed, letting himself fall back onto the bed. He needed to find a way to get in contact with him. Maybe he could send him another DM, though speaking that thought out loud earned him a funny look from Nikandros.

“So, your plan is to message him and tell him that you saw him in a coffee shop, even though he clearly wants to stay anonymous? Definitely not creepy.”

He had a point.

“What if I post a video asking him to work with me? His fans will see it and he’ll have to respond.”

Nikandros considered it for a moment before nodding.

“It could work.”

After a few takes and a good hour later, the video was on Instagram.

“Now we wait,” Nikandros said.


	2. Chapter 2

“ _Hello, I’ve received your proposition and saw your video. Though I’m honored, I must refuse your offer. I hope you find another artist. Sincerely, Lamagician.”_

“Fuck!” Nikandros said as he finished reading. “Man, I’m sorry.”

“He doesn’t even give a reason!” Damen said, throwing his phone on the bed. “How am I supposed to convince him if he won’t even tell me what’s wrong? Doesn’t he realize what working with me could mean for him? It would propel his career!”

“I don’t know. Honestly, you should just move on and find someone else. Remember that girl? What was her name? SandraTx I think? Her cover was amazing.”

He sighed, throwing his head back on the pillow. He didn’t want SandraTx. He didn’t want anyone but Lamagician. His voice was incredible, bewitching. Once you listened to a voice like that, it was impossible to consider singing with anyone else. 

“Could we continue tomorrow?” he asked, “I’d like to be alone, listen to more covers and wrap my head around it.”

“Sure,” Nikandros said, gathering his things. He was about to leave when he turned back, a serious expression on his face, “you’re not gonna message him, are you?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Because you’ve got the face of someone who’s about to make a mistake.”

Damen rolled his eyes and pushed Nikandros outside.

“I’m fine, I promise. No mistakes will be made tonight.”

“Alright, I trust you. Because messaging him would be a huge mistake.”

“I know.”

“He won’t answer, and you’ll look like a creep.”

“I’ve got it, now leave me alone please.”

Nikandros warned him one last time, much to Damen’s annoyance, before finally leaving the room. He followed him to the gates and, after locking himself inside, went back to his room.

What could possibly go wrong with a single message?

“ _Hey Lamagician, I’m really sorry to hear that you aren’t interested in collaborating. Could you give me an explanation? Maybe we could find a way to change your mind.”_

Should he have put an emoji at the end? Or would that be too much?

Yes, he should put one.

“J”

Now he looked like a creep. Hopefully, the guy will laugh about it.

Two hours went by and he still hadn’t gotten an answer.

He only had four more days to find someone and less than a month to write them a song, practice and record it. If he didn’t have anything to present to Halvik… well, he didn’t even want to think about that possibility.

He sighed, his head falling back against the pillow. He’d been in this house thinking over the same thing for too long now. He needed some fresh air to clear his head.

His mind made, he went to his car and started driving without any destination in mind. He needed to present someone to Halvik, but none of the artists he had listened to were good enough. There was no way he could bare his soul in a song to an artist he didn’t like.

Music was his thing. It had been here for him when he was alone; when no one else was by his side. It had been his best friend and his rock, and he couldn’t betray it so easily. What’s the worst that could happen, Halvik would fire him? Finding artists had never been his job in the first place. Even if he did lose his job, he didn’t think he would have trouble finding a new one. Well, he hoped anyway.

Kastor had taken over Akielon Records a year ago now, right after their father died. The company might not be as important in the business as it once was, but it was important enough that other record companies might be reluctant to hire him.

He stopped his car in the parking lot of a fast-food place and walked in. It was chaos; children were screaming and running everywhere, people were on their phones, and he even spotted a teen playing a movie loudly. This was exactly what he needed. Here at least, he wouldn’t be able to hear his own thoughts.

His order made, he found an empty spot and sat down, eyes closed as he tried to empty his head. He just had to find someone, anyone, with the slightest glimmer of talent and then he will be able to move on. It didn’t matter if they weren’t picked up for a contract, it wasn’t his mission anymore. All he had to do was record a song and he could do that.

A loud sound yanked him out of his thoughts, and he opened his eyes just in time to see a bunch of teenagers running for their lives out of the restaurant. He frowned and looked around, trying to see what their stupidity had wrought. He didn’t see anything obvious, instead, his eyes locked with a face he’d seen before, and those blue eyes were looking right back at him.

Lamagician.

Of its own accord, his body dragged him across the room until he was standing in front of Lamagician wearing his most charming smile. If this wasn’t a twist of fate, then he didn’t know what it was.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Damen. I’m the clumsy giant who destroyed your coat yesterday.”

“I remember you.”

Unlike him, the man didn’t seem even a little bit happy to see him. In fact, he looked like he was about to run at the first opportunity.

“Can I sit?”

“Of course. I was leaving.”

He got up before Damen had time to do anything and started to walk away. Quickly, Damen pulled himself together and followed him, running to catch up until they were walking side by side.

“I know you,” he said.

“Yes, we’ve already established that.”

“No, I mean, I know who you are.”

They stopped walking.

Lamagician’s expression changed right away, to something that Damen was unable to read.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that I know that you’re Lamagician,” he said calmly, not quite understanding what was happening. Did he want to keep his identity a secret?

Most of the tension the man was holding left his body, his shoulders visibly relaxing in a matter of a few seconds.

“How do you know?”

“I recognized you. Well, your voice. I’m Damen-“

“Akielon, yes, I know. Did you follow me?”

“What? No! Of course not! It was just… a happy coincidence.”

“Depends on who you ask.”

“Well, probably more for me than for you, that’s for sure,” he smiled, trying to get a smile in return. He did not. “Could we sit? Have a little chat?”

“I’ve already told you no.”

“I know, I know, and I respect that, it’s just… you’re talented. I’ve spent the last three days listening to artists singing songs without any real emotion behind them or any meaning behind the words, and you… you sing with your soul. I need to work with you. We could do so many things together.”

Lamagician was quiet for a moment, his lips slowly turning up into something Damen might describe as a smirk.

“Do you say that to every artist or only the ones you follow into parking lots?”

That was… not the answer he was expecting.

His own smile fell. How could he have fucked up this badly? He floundered as he tried to find something to say, but nothing coherent would come out.

“Listen, Damen, I appreciate you reaching out to me, but I’m not the artist you’re looking for, I can promise you that. Put your energy into finding someone else.”

“No, you don’t get it! No matter who I find, they won’t be able to sing like you. I’ve already started thinking about the kinds of songs you could sing. We could do a mix of the slow songs you seem to prefer, and some more energetic ones. I’ve started changing songs I’ve written so they can fit your style. If you could just give me five minutes, I could show them to you.”

Lamagician rolled his eyes in exasperation before taking his keys out of his pocket and jumping into his car.

“It was nice meeting you. Hopefully, it won’t happen again. Bye, Damen.”

“Wait!” he said, putting his backpack down and digging inside.

He took the last song he’d written and gave it to Lamagician without giving him time to react.

“Read it, sing it, and if you like it, text me.”

“If it’s as cliché as most of your songs, I can already tell you I won’t like it.”

Without giving a second look, he started his car and drove away.

“You did what now?” Nikandros asked – well, yelled more like – after Damen told him what happened.

He couldn’t blame him. Nikandros asked him not to be creepy, and not only did he send an awkward message, but he also met up with Lamagician and then followed him into a parking lot.

“It’s not as bad as it sounds, I promise.”

“Oh, really? Because it sounds bad. Really bad. And useless! What did you think was gonna happen, huh? You thought he would see your pretty face and decided that, yes, now he definitely wanted to work with you?”

“I - no, I just - I don’t know. I thought I could make him change his mind!”

“Well, you didn’t. I think you’ve made it worse. You’re risking the studio’s reputation here.”

Damen bit his lip as a wave of guilt washed over him. He didn’t mean to scare Lamagician and he really thought he could change his mind and make him see how much he loved his voice.

“Hey, it’s ok,” Nikandros said. “Considering how the guy answered you, it’s probably a good thing he refused to work with you. The last thing you need is another diva who treats you like garbage.”

Jokaste. That was whom Nikandros was talking about. Damen helped launch her career, but as soon as she’d started to get a little recognition, she’d turned into an awful diva who had him at the end of leash. He’d let her treat him like she wanted, giving in to every one of her crazy desires, even when it meant walking miles to get the exact type of coffee she wanted. In the meantime, she was cheating on him with his brother and planning ways to get Damen’s cut out of their father’s legacy.

The memory made him shiver and he sat down, defeated.

“I will contact SandraTx tomorrow,” he declared.

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”

Whether he was talking about Lamagician or Jokaste, he didn’t say.

Unsurprisingly, he dreamt of Jokaste that night.

_She was on stage, singing Dreams of Never, the first song he wrote for her. It was the one that propelled her, that transformed her from the bottom to the top of the industry. She wasn’t just a pretty girl anymore, she was an artist, a strong woman. She had claimed the song was her’s and Damen had let her do it. He would have stayed in her shadow forever if it meant she could get all the light._

_In his dream, she was singing at the top of her lungs, screaming the words as if she understood them, even though she never could get beyond the hidden message behind them._

_Then Kastor was there on stage too, next to her, kissing her and hugging her the same way Damen used to so long ago._

_It wasn’t the fact that she’d left him. He’d known it would happen, eventually. It was the betrayal, the lies, the waste of his father’s finals moments._

_He turned around and he saw Nikandros next to him._

_“You were never good enough for her, you know?”_

_Yes. He knew._

_“All this time and you didn’t see anything,” Kastor said. “She never loved you.”_

_He knew that, too. She had told him so, the night he’d walked on them._

_She laughed when he told her they could fix it._

_How could they fix something that never was?_

_Voices were coming from everywhere; his father, Nikandros, Kastor, Jokaste, Halvik. They were all screaming at him, all laughing at him. He was alone. Completely alone. No one was by his side and no one would be. He wasn’t good enough for any of them._

He woke up with a scream, sweat coating his body as he tried to come back to his senses.

He could hear his heart drumming in his ears, his brain still trying to realize that it was a nightmare, that nothing was real.

Except that it was.

Once he calmed down, he lay back on his bed. He knew they were right. He wasn’t a failure. He was talented. But having Lamagician refusing to work with him made him have doubts about himself. If he was so good, how come someone as talented as Lamagician didn’t want to work with him?

He thought back to what he’d said earlier. Cliché. His songs weren’t cliché! Sure, most of them talked about love, but that wasn’t a bad thing. Maybe _he_ wasn’t the problem. Maybe Lamagician was.

His phone buzzed next to him and he hesitated for a moment before grabbing it. He didn’t want to talk to anyone right now, not when he was in this state.

Finally, he picked it up, knowing that if someone was texting him at this hour it must be important.

He expected Nikandros’s name to appear but instead saw Lamagician’s.

“ _If the offer still stands, I would like to give it a try.”_

It was sudden and unexpected, but somehow, it was enough to put a smile on his face.

Maybe he didn’t screw everything up, after all.


	3. Chapter 3

[](https://ibb.co/nwF97QJ)

Fifteen minutes. That was the total number of minutes that had passed since Laurent walked into Damen’s private record studio. Laurent, not Lawrence, like Damen had mistakenly said when Laurent introduced himself as something other than Lamagician. In his defense, he had put some background music on that made it hard to hear perfectly. Still, it had made things a little awkward, which resulted in them not doing anything but staring at their feet for almost ten minutes.

“So, uh, do you want a coffee or something?”

“No.”

“A cookie? I have cookies if you want, I mean-“

“Shouldn’t we get started?” Laurent asked, a little impatiently. He was uncomfortable, to say the least. Damen wasn’t much better.

“I-well, yeah, sure. Of course,” he rolled his armchair to his desk and started digging through his papers. “I picked up some songs I would like to hear you sing if that’s alright with you. I just want to have a better understanding of what you can do. Did you take music classes?”

“Yes. I went to the Liberty Charter School.”

“You did?” Damen asked, surprised. The Liberty Charter School was a prestigious private school specializing in art. From acting to painting, all students who went there ended up with a name and a contract. Everyone except Laurent, apparently.

“Yes.”

“And they didn’t find you a contract with a record company?”

“No.”

Apparently, Laurent didn’t know how to form answers with more than a few words. Damen was starting to wonder if he’d made the right decision; if they couldn’t get past this awkward hump and start an easy relationship there was no way they would be able to produce something good. They both needed to be comfortable with each other.

“Alright, let’s get started,” he declared, handing the sheet music and lyrics to Laurent.

To say Laurent was good would be an understatement.

No matter what songs Damen asked him to sing, he would always find a way to make them better than the original version. It wasn’t just raw talent either; Laurent was a perfectionist. He practiced, again and again, studying the songs until he could capture the feelings perfectly. It was as if they’d been written by him and for him only.

Damen recorded Laurent singing a few songs and presented them to Halvik who absolutely loved them. She had already given her approval for them to start recording an original song when she asked to see a picture of Laurent.

He had known Halvik would ask for a picture. For Halvik, a good singer was mostly based on whether or not people found them attractive. Getting a picture of Laurent had been a hard-won task, given the fact that he always found an excuse not to provide one, but Damen knew he had to show Laurent’s picture to Halvik otherwise she would never allow them to start recording.

“He could use some virility, but I like his long eyelashes. Look at this, he looks like… like a cow!”

Damen was 100% sure that it was the only time Laurent had ever been compared to a cow, but he decided to keep it to himself. Surely, Laurent didn’t need to know. 

Damen tried to remain calm as he watched Laurent reading the song he’d chosen for him. It would be their first original song. Until then, they’d only done covers as a test for Laurent to see what both of them loved and didn’t love. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been so anxious over a song. He was talented. His songs were perfect, masterpieces even. If Laurent couldn’t see that, it was his problem.

Not really, though. If Laurent didn’t like his song, they would be at a dead-end.

“Ok,” Laurent simply said.

“Ok?”

“I’ll sing it.”

“Do you like it?” he asked a little hurt by the lack of interest from Laurent.

“It’s fine. Better than most of your songs.”

It wasn’t a compliment by far, but he knew it was the best he would get. For someone with no actual career, Laurent sure was honest when it came to his opinions. If he didn’t have such an incredible voice, Damen would have already thrown him out of his studio.

He didn’t, of course. Instead, he said, “Let’s do it then.”

“Try to hold it a little more,” Damen said in the speaker.

Laurent nodded and started singing again, following Damen’s request and holding the last note longer than before. It still wasn’t right. Laurent was singing perfectly, but everything just felt… off. Damen sighed, slowly rubbing his temples in an attempt to relax. It didn’t work.

They’d started working on original content a few days ago but despite the twenty-something songs Damen wrote, nothing seemed to resonate with Laurent.

“So?” Laurent asked as he walked out of the studio.

“It’s… good.”

“It’s not.”

“It is. It’s just not perfect.”

“The lyrics are good. Maybe I should try to hold it longer again? Or we could switch those to verses,” he set the papers in front of Damen and started tracing over them. “This way, it will break up the rhythm a little, which could make something less regimented.”

“I like that,” he admitted. “I don’t know if it will be enough, but we could try.”

Laurent seemed as frustrated as he was. He couldn’t blame him; they had been recording for hours without a break and minimal results, even he was starting to get tired.

“Hey, it’s just not the right song. I’m sure we will find something.”

“Please, Damen, we’ve done over twenty variations, and nothing is working. The problem isn’t with the songs.”

Damen knew that, but he wanted a song that would resonate perfectly with Laurent, but the problem was, he had no idea who Laurent was.

Apart from his first name and where he went to school, Damen didn’t know anything about Laurent. He didn’t even know his last name, since, according to Laurent, he had no need of knowing it before they had to sign a contract. He didn’t know what Laurent loved, what he hated, his family, his childhood, his love life. Nothing. How could he write him a song if he had no idea of who he was? If he could understand Laurent better, figure out what made Laurent tick, he was sure they could move forward.

“What if we took a break?” he offered. “I could order us some food and then we’ll see what we want to do.”

Laurent seemed to hesitate for a moment and when Damen was about to take his offer back, he nodded.

“Fine, but I’m paying.”

It wasn’t a question and Damen didn’t protest.

Half an hour later and one pizza down, the atmosphere between them loosened up a little, but Laurent continued to answer his questions vaguely without putting any effort into the conversation.

He had texted Nikandros discreetly earlier hoping that his friend could come to his rescue. After five texts where he reminded him that he had told him to choose someone other than Laurent, Nikandros finally gave a potentially helpful answer.

“ _Why don’t you ask him about his name? Lamagician is not common. There’s probably a story behind it.”_

Well, at this point he didn’t have much to lose anyway. He may as well try Nikandros’ idea.

“How did you choose your nickname?” he asked, breaking the silence that fallen.

If Laurent was surprised by the question, it only showed for a second before disappearing.

“My brother used to call me that when I was younger. I had… I was quite into magic.”

“Oh, you have a brother?”

Finally, something they had in common.

“Had, yes.”

Of course. Because how could things be complete without him rubbing salt in the wound?

“Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean- I’m sorry.”

“It’s ok,” Laurent reassured him. “I don’t mind talking about him. He was a great man; I don’t want him to be forgotten.”

“Is it for him that you sang _Tired of Heaven_?”

“Yes,” he said, a small smile on his face. “It’s a beautiful song. Probably my favorite.”

“From all the songs that I wrote?”

“No, just… my favorite.”

Damen was taken aback, having not expected such compliment. He couldn’t believe that one of his songs could be someone’s favorite when so many others were better than his. That someone like Laurent, demanding and perfectionist, could choose one of his songs as his favorite was unbelievable.

“Thank you,” he said softly. “I wrote it for my dad. He was… quite a man, too.”

Laurent looked at him for a moment, with an unreadable expression on his face. Laurent’s face was always unreadable, another art he excelled at. Damen could never tell what he was feeling, what he was thinking. But right now, his expression seemed a bit softer than usual.

He lifted his glass of soda in Damen’s direction.

“To the great men that left us.”

Damen’s chest tightened and he lifted his drink too.

“To the great men that left us.”

“We need a break,” Damen declared.

“No, we don’t need a break. There are only two weeks left. A break is the last thing we need.”

“Yes, we do. We’re not making any progress here. I say we take a day off and try again tomorrow.”

“Is that your solution? I go back to my place and do the exact same thing tomorrow?”

“I didn’t say that,” he smiled. “We’re going out. You and I.”

This seemed to perplex Laurent.

“Why would we do that? We’re not friends.”

“But we could be!”

“I don’t want us to be,” Laurent said in all honesty.

Damen would be lying if he said Laurent’s words didn’t crush him. Everybody loved him. He was nice, funny, and smart, why wouldn’t Laurent want to be his friend? Then again, Laurent wasn’t everybody.

“Alright, see it as a _get to know your coworkers better,_ type of thing.”

Laurent was quiet for a moment but finally agreeing without Damen having to come up with more arguments.

“Where are we going?”

“There’s a museum, a few miles away.”

“A museum? That’s what you want to do during your break?”

“Oh, come on! Don’t tell me you don’t like visiting museums.”

“I do. I didn’t expect you to like it, though.”

“What can I say? I’m a mysterious guy,” he winked. Laurent replied by rolling his eyes.

The drive to the museum gave Damen a chance to discover a few more things about Laurent; the main thing being that he didn’t like to talk while driving. It probably had something to do with the fact that he listened to his music loud enough to make all the windows in the car shake. He had mistakenly thought Laurent would more be the type to enjoy really soft music, maybe even meditation.

This was not that.

The same went for his driving. He was obviously in total control of his vehicle, and Damen thanked whatever God was watching, because, given the speed he was going, they would both be dead otherwise. 

“Why do you look like you’re gonna throw up?” he asked after parking his car in a single movement. If Damen wasn’t so scared, he would probably be impressed.

“You have a… particular, way of driving.”

“I’m an excellent driver,” Laurent defended himself, offended. “I’ve never had a single accident.”

“Yeah, I think that’s because people literally pull themselves off of the road when they see you.”

“Really funny,” he rolled his eyes again, but for a short moment, Damen could have sworn his lips curled into a smirk.

They headed towards the museum side by side, Damen silently praying for his plan to work.

Truth was, he wasn’t a fan of museums, despite what he’d told Laurent. Sure, he enjoyed a visit once every few years if there was a special exposition that seemed interesting, but he would never have chosen to go on his day off.

Laurent, on the other hand, seemed to be exactly the type of person who would spend hours and hours in a museum, and that is exactly why he proposed this activity. If he could get Laurent to open up even a little, he would consider it a success, and doing something he loved seemed to be the best way to get there.

“Two tickets, please,” he said, already taking his wallet out of his pocket.

“I’m paying,” Laurent quickly said, trying to step up.

Luckily for Damen, he was quicker and paid for the tickets before Laurent could get the money out in time.

The cashier couldn’t hold back a smile that only grew bigger when she noticed Laurent’s annoyed face.

“Guess you weren’t fast enough,” Damen shrugged with a smile on his face.

Laurent didn’t bother answering him and started walking towards the tour queue.

“I think you pissed off your boyfriend,” the cashier jokingly said.

“Oh no, he’s not- we’re not together.”

She gave him a not-so-convinced smile, making Damen blush furiously.

“Damen? Are you coming?” Laurent asked.

“I-Yeah!”

He speed-walked until he was next to him and refused to look back at the cashier, not wanting to see her smug face.

“Were you hitting on her? She was looking at you weirdly,” Laurent asked as they started walking. 

“She was hitting on me.”

Laurent shook his head and held a map to him. Damen frowned. Was he trying to get rid of him already?

“I thought we would do the tour together,” he admitted.

“Yes, but if you decide to meet someone for a quickie, I won’t be waiting for you so you may as well find your way back.”

“I don’t plan on meeting anyone,” he said as he threw the map in the trashcan next to him.

Laurent didn’t seem all that impressed by his gesture, but he was kind enough not to comment. They were making progress; a week ago, he would have called him an idiot.

The first half of the visit was made with barely any talk, much to Damen’s distress. He tried to make small talk, to crack a joke here and here, but Laurent would barely acknowledge him, too deep in his own thoughts.

Damen had expected him to love the visit, of course, but he hadn’t realized just how much he would love it. He was looking at the paintings with so much intensity, so much interest, it was as if he was capable of seeing something that others couldn’t see. No matter how hard Damen would stare, he wasn’t able to see whatever Laurent was seeing. He could see the beauty, admire the technique, but what Laurent was seeing seemed to be much deeper.

“You don’t seem to be having a lot of fun,” Laurent commented after a while. “For someone who chose the activity, you sure look like you regret it.”

“Not at all! I love it, I just… I don’t love it as much as you do.”

“Years of practice, I assume. Painting was an essential part of my studies. I wasn’t a fan of it at first, but I came to appreciate it and eventually, I realized that it was more than some old pictures.”

“Hey, I don’t think it’s some old picture, alright?” That succeeded in getting a smile out of Laurent. “Was it the same for music? Did your studies made you fall in love with it?”

“No, not at all,” he replied.

They walked into a dark room and took a seat. He’d heard of this installment, _Afterthought,_ a dark room full of little lights representing stars, much like a planetarium, but instead of our galaxy, each constellation represented a different image. What was seen was up to the spectator and a lot of people considered it a masterpiece, probably because they were the ones deciding what they could or couldn’t see.

“My brother, Auguste. He’s the one that changed music for me. My family had been working in the music industry for a long time, but I didn’t have their passion. Auguste… Auguste changed that. He made me see and hear what I couldn’t before. He was the first one to see that I could sing.”

“Did he die a long time ago?”

“When I was twelve,” Laurent said, “You would think I would have gotten over it over the years.”

He bit his lip, his throat so tight that it made his voice rough.

“I don’t think you ever get over something like that,” Damen admitted.

“Did you get over your father’s death?”

The question surprised him. Laurent had never shown any interest concerning his life before, probably because most of his life was on the internet. Contrary to Laurent, his entire life could be found on a tabloid page, from the moment of his birth to his first award. It left little room for secrets.

Has he gotten over his father’s death? He wasn’t sure. They were days where he could barely get out of the bed, the pain of having lost someone so important in his life was too much. They were days where he would smile randomly, recalling times they’d shared together writing music or watching the Super Bowl. There were days where he would forget his father wasn’t here anymore and he would instinctively grab his phone to call him. Shamefully, he would also admit that they were days where he wouldn’t think of him at all.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I would like to say that I did, but it wouldn’t be true. I think… I think I’m learning how to live without him. We used to bond over music and every time I write a new song, I like to think that I’m keeping a part of him alive.”

“I didn’t know you were close. I thought he disinherited you, right before passing.”

“He did,” Damen admitted, his jaw involuntarily clenching. “My brother… my brother manipulated him. He talked him into removing me from the will and leaving everything to him. I tried to talk to my father, but he wouldn’t listen. In the end, I stopped trying to make him listen because I knew we didn’t have a lot of time left. Our relationship wasn’t the same when he died.”

He didn’t realize he had started crying before feeling something wet sliding down his face. He hadn’t talked about it to anyone, not even Nikandros. He feared that no one would understand or that they’d have taken pity on him. He didn’t want pity.

“We should go. I’m starving.”

He started to get up when he felt Laurent’s hand rest on top of his. He turned his head and was met with Laurent’s intense gaze, his blue eyes shining in the dim light of the room.

“I think we should stay a little longer.”

His throat to tight for him to talk, Damen simply nodded and sat back down, his heart pounding heavily inside his chest. Without thinking, he flipped his hand until he could hold Laurent’s hand, offering him the support they probably both needed.

They shared a meal at the museum’s restaurant where Damen learned that stealing a single french fry from Laurent meant having half of his desert stolen, before continuing their visit.

They’ve talked more, so much more that somewhere along the line, they forgot to pay attention to the masterpieces in front of them and only focused on each other. Or rather, Damen only focused on Laurent.

He learned that Laurent had a cat named Eclipse. He had found him one night in the middle of the road and he had almost run him over, not realizing what it was immediately. He was only a few hours old and the vet didn’t give him much of a chance to live, but Laurent had insisted on taking him home. Five years later and he was proudly showing pictures of him to Damen, who couldn’t help but feel he was giving access to some never told secrets.

Quickly though, the conversation drifted to Damen’s life and his relationship with Jokase – something that Laurent took pleasure in ridiculing. For the first time, Damen was able to laugh about it instead of crying as he had done for the last few months.

“She asked you to drive for two hours to get her chicken wings and you did it?” Laurent asked, dumbfounded.

“It was a stressful time for her! I wanted her to be happy!”

“And you didn’t find it strange? At all?”

“Yes, I did, but I didn’t think, ‘ _Oh, she must have asked me that so I wouldn’t be here and she could fuck my brother_.’”

“Well, sure, but you could have thought, ‘ _this is weird and she must be hiding something.’_ ”

“It’s easier to see that once you know the truth,” he defended himself. “I thought she really loved me, you know? But she just… used me.”

“She chose you because you were nice and generous,” Laurent said. “There’s no shame in being a good man.”

Damen nodded, not sure of what to say, and he let Laurent guide him out of the museum. The sun was already going down; only now making Damen realize just how long they had been inside the museum.

They bought some ice cream and decided to sit down in the park. Much to Damen’s surprise, Laurent even agreed to sit on the ground itself, despise wearing a light-colored blue jean.

“You know,” Damen began, “I don’t understand why you never show your face on your videos.”

“Being in the spotlight it’s… it’s not what I want. I want people to focus on my voice, not on my appearance.”

“But your appearance, it’s a part of your talent. When you’re singing, your whole face lights up; I can see the emotions washing through you. Hearing you sing is bewitching, but seeing you? It’s… unbelievable. Plus, yes, being in the spotlight is hard, but you can still have a normal life!”

“I don’t know. I’m good like this, just being a voice on a computer is good enough for me.”

“You know you’ll have to show your face when Imagine Records signs you for the album?”

“They won’t sign me for the album,” Laurent said.

“What? Of course, they will!”

“No, they won’t.”

There wasn’t any kind of doubt in Laurent’s words, as if he knew for sure that he never stood a chance. It wasn’t true, and Damen wanted to make sure he understood it.

“They will, and if they don’t want to, I’ll force them to.”

Laurent laughed, his cheeks turning slightly red at Damen’s promise. He was beautiful. His eyes were shining with happiness, his face lighting up with joy.

“It won’t work, but thank you, I appreciate it.”

He didn’t protest, but he made himself a silent promise that he would keep his word. If he had to put his own career at risk, he would.

“Could we get home? It’s getting cold.”

“Sure,” he said, offering Laurent his hand to pull him back on his feet. “Come on, let’s head home.”

They drove in silence but unlike this morning, it was a comfortable one, and Laurent even made an effort to drive slower.

As soon as he was inside his house, he rushed to the bathroom and took a quick shower. His body was finally catching up to him and all the walking they’d done today. He could already feel himself falling asleep. After his shower, he fell heavily onto his bed, not even bothering to put boxers on, and closed his eyes.

Despite being tired, he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about all the revelations of today; his heart and mind were full of emotions. He couldn’t remember the last time he had so much fun, or the last time he felt so connected to someone.

Laurent was… Laurent was everything. He put so many protectives layers around himself that it was hard to see at first glance, but now that Damen could see, he couldn’t look anywhere else. Quickly, he grabbed his notebook and started writing. The words and melody flew right through his fingers easily.

Their previous song was wrong, it didn’t feel like Laurent. It was a great song, but not a song for someone like Laurent, who had been through so much pain and still hadn’t broken, but, instead, had come out of it stronger than ever. He wanted a song Laurent could identify with and now that he knew him a little bit better, he knew he could give him that.


	4. Chapter 4

[](https://ibb.co/XXHpPhk)

He handed the new song lyrics to Laurent as soon as he took his first step inside the studio, refusing to waste any time.

“What is it?”

“It's your new song.”

“You’re changing the song two weeks before the deadline?” Laurent raised an eyebrow in his direction.

“It’s not like we had anything to present them. I mean, the things we recorded were good, but I don’t want to present something that isn’t perfect, and I know you don’t want to either.”

Laurent seemed skeptical at first but after a few seconds of reflection, he held the paper up and read the title aloud. “ _Give me his Shadow_?”

“Read it, please.”

Damen watched him anxiously, trying to make out of every one of his emotions, but despite his best effort, he was unable to figure out what he was thinking.

The song was good. Of course, it was good, he was the one who wrote it after all, but he wasn’t sure if it was good enough for Laurent. He couldn’t remember ever being so insecure about his art. Even writing for Jokaste never felt like this. Then again, he’d never had to work so hard to impress someone before, nor did he had such an urge to impress them.

“It’s adequate,” Laurent finally said, a smile appearing on his face. Damen couldn’t remember seeing this particular smile before.

“Is it?” He was surprised. From anyone else, it would have seemed like a small compliment, but he knew Laurent’s love for that word and what he actually meant. It was the highest compliment Laurent could give him, and he accepted it gladly.

“Yes.”

They started running through the song right after Laurent warmed up his voice, and Damen was captivated from the first lyrics out of Laurent’s mouth.

He was singing with everything he had, his face twisting beautifully with every note. He didn’t look the same when he was singing; he seemed more free, happier. He didn’t look as cold either and Damen allowed himself to stare a bit more than usual.

Laurent’s hair was pulled back in a loose tie that was barely holding anything, giving him a messy appearance that Damen couldn’t get enough of. Is that how his hair would look after a roll in the sheets?

He thought more about it. He imagined Laurent walking out of the bathroom completely naked, his long legs dripping with water, his hair wet and his face soft. He would walk around the room and throw himself on the bed – Damen’s bed – before rolling off on to his stomach to present his perfect ass. Damen had of course noticed, more than once, how round and perky his ass was whenever Laurent would bend over or turn around. The fact that Laurent only wore tight pants wasn’t helping either.

Laurent held a note a little longer and this time, Damen imagined him screaming his name. He imagined the little sounds he would make and the way he would moan and beg for more.

“ _Damen.”_ He could hear him singing it, his breath short with pleasure. “ _Damen.”_

“Damen!”

He jumped on his seat when he realized that Laurent had, in fact, been calling him. He felt himself getting hot and tried to look anywhere but at Laurent.

“Was it that bad?”

“No, no, it was good!” he hurried to say. “I’m gonna play it so you can listen to it.”

He started the song and realized that he barely listened to Laurent singing, too caught in his daydream. He was pleased to see that the song turned out nicely. They had some minor things to work on here and here, but other than that, the song was a hundred times better than anything they’d recorded until now. Maybe Damen was exaggerating, maybe he wasn’t, all that mattered was that now, they knew they could make something amazing.

“Do you like it?” he asked Laurent when the song ended.

“I do, a lot actually,” Laurent admitted, a smile on his face. “You really worked yourself out with this. Good job.”

Damen smiled back, his heart brimming with pride.

“There are some minor changes you need to make, though. In the second verse, it needs to come from your core, like… deeper.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you want.”

“Hold on, I’m gonna show you.”

He walked into the recording room and positioned himself behind Laurent, who gave him a weird look.

“What are you doing exactly?”

“Showing you,” he answered, taking the paper out of his hands and holding it up. “Come on, start singing. I’ll help you.”

Laurent didn’t seem convinced but didn’t protest, much to Damen’s surprise, and started singing.

Slowly as not to scare him, Damen placed his hand on Laurent’s stomach and pressed on it lightly. Laurent jumped from the surprise but didn’t try to get away, apparently understanding what he was doing.

The goal was to apply some pressure on his stomach so he could change his way of breathing and, inevitably, of singing. Quickly though, Damen forgot why he was doing what he was doing.

He could feel each of Laurent’s breathes against his hand, his stomach rising and falling. He could feel the words forming in his guts and making their way to his mouth. He could feel Laurent’s emotions, the warmness coming through him.

In a moment of weakness, Damen pushed himself closer to him, until there wasn’t an inch of space between them. He felt Laurent tense against him, and he immediately pulled his hand away from his stomach. If Laurent wanted to move away from him, all he had to do was take a step forward. He didn’t.

Instead, he pressed himself more into Damen’s chest and continuing singing, breathing the same way Damen showed him a few minutes earlier.

His voice made every hair on Damen’s stand up. Every note he sang held a million different emotions, all of them coming together perfectly and forming only one soft whisper in his ear, like a siren’s song.

That was what Laurent was; a siren capable of making Damen do everything he wanted using nothing but the sound of his voice.

It really wasn’t just the sound of his voice, though. It was all of him that could make Damen go insane. It was the way his eyes closed when he sang, the way his lips parted when the words escaped his mouth, the way he moved his hands as if he was trying to touch the notes with the tip of his fingers and the way he threw his head against Damen’s shoulder when he hit the final verse.

His face buried in Laurent’s hair with no space between them, Damen wondered if Laurent could feel his heart pounding against his back, feel the crazy speed with which it was beating. He wondered if he could feel him hardening in his jeans, too.

If he could, he didn’t say a word, and carefully, as if approaching a wild cat, Damen pushed a stray piece of Laurent’s hair behind his ear.

He lowered his mouth until his lips were only a few inches away from Laurent’s neck, his breath making him shiver. 

“Say yes,” he whispered, right into Laurent’s ear.

Laurent stayed silent, but his eyes were closed and his lips parted at the command.

“I won’t do it if you don’t say yes.”

“Yes,” Laurent breathe out. “Yes.”

He didn’t waste any more time and closed the gap between them, his lips slowly kissing Laurent’s neck. He felt him relax under him as he tilted his head to the side, giving him more room to work.

With a quick movement, he turned Laurent around and kissed him hard, knocking their teeth together in the process. Neither of them seemed to care and Laurent happily opened his mouth, allowing Damen inside.

“I’ve dreamt of that since the first time I met you,” Damen confessed.

Laurent didn’t answer but pressed harder against him, his hands cupping Damen’s face to deepen the kiss. Damen’s own hands moved from his hair to his waist. Their size difference was so great that he could almost wrap his arms all the way around him. He would have no trouble picking him up and that thought sent all his blood directly to his dick.

Slowly, as if it was painfully hurting him, Laurent broke the kiss, his forehead against Damen’s.

“Was it adequate?” Damen jokingly asked.

Laurent laughed before pulling away from him, a wild smile on his face.

“It was, yes.”

He wished he could say that the rest of the day was spent kissing and cuddling, but that wasn’t the case. Instead, they alternated between kisses and working, much to his frustration.

The fact that they were almost done recording was a blessing and a relief that he gladly accepted, though. Laurent was singing with the perfect intonation, the text coming to life a little more with each one of his run-throughs. They kept changing things, adding news verses and changing existing ones, Damen’s head swimming with new inspiration, their minds working together in a way that Damen had never experienced before.

Damen may have been imagining it, but Laurent’s voice seemed a bit hoarse with a desire, which was perfectly matching Damen’s own feelings.

“How was that one?” Laurent asked after finishing the song.

“Hot,” he answered.

He rolled his eyes, but Damen didn’t miss the smirk that spread across his face. God, how he loved that face.

“Should we do it again?”

“No, I think we’re done for today. I’ll listen to them again tomorrow with Nikandros and I’ll let you know if we need to record something else.”

“So, we’re done?” Laurent asked as he walked out of the recording room.

“We’re done recording, yeah.”

Laurent walked toward him and stopped when he was directly in front of him. Sitting on his chair, Damen found his eyes running up and down Laurent’s body.

“I’ll head home, then.”

“You could,” Damen hurried to say, his arms already coming up to curl around Laurent’s waist. “Or you could stay with me.”

Laurent pretended to think about it, through Damen already knew he was about to say yes if the way his body was relaxed under his hands was any indication.

“I could.”

Damen smiled and pulled him closer until he had no other choice but to sit on his lap, one leg on each side of his body.

He was a little surprised by how easy Laurent let himself fall into his arms, but he didn’t protest one bit. There was a little voice in his head telling him that something was off. Laurent wasn’t the kind to make decisions without thinking them to death and surely, sleeping together was putting his career at risk. If Halvik found out, she would quickly dismiss Laurent and his career will be dead before it even started.

He wasn’t blaming Laurent, of course – he hadn’t been able to resist the temptation, so why would Laurent- but he knew that Laurent was stronger than that.

“You’re thinking too much,” Laurent said. “Why is that?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you want to stop?”

Did he want to stop? No. He certainly didn’t.

“No.”

“Then relax,” Laurent said, dropping a kiss on his jaw, then another one on his neck.

He wanted to tell Laurent what he was thinking, the doubts he was suddenly having, but instead, he wrapped his arms around his waist and held him tighter.

He’d have time to think about it later.

“You slept with him,” Nikandros said the next time he saw him.

“What?”

“Laurent. You slept with him.”

“Why do you- I didn’t!”

Nikandros glared at him, apparently not buying a word of what he was saying.

Damen sighed, knowing too well that there wasn’t any chance he would be able to convince his friend.

“He slept in my bed, but we didn’t have sex.”

Nikandros kept looking at him, waiting for more.

Damen sighed again.

“Not full sex. Just like… you know. A little fooling around, I guess?”

“A little-“ Nikandros face turned red and he punched Damen’s arm. “I told you not to have sex with him! Can’t you stop thinking with your dick, for once?”

“I wasn’t expecting it! He was just here, singing, and I don’t know, we had grown closer.”

“Oh yeah? That’s funny because two weeks ago, you were telling me how cold and distant he was.”

“Yeah but a lot happened since then!”

“Yeah, you’ve written him a new song, that he miraculously sang perfectly from the first try.”

“Why are you saying?”

“I’m saying that he’s using you.”

“Using me for what? I was supposed to write him a song and that’s what I did!”

“No, he was supposed to sing the song you’ve already written! Instead, he had you taking him out, paying for his food and writing a new goddam song because he didn’t like the previous one!”

“That’s not what this is about,” he said, his jaw clenched. “This is art, alright? We’re making art together. _I_ decided to take him out. _I_ decided to pay for his food. He didn’t ask for a thing!”

“Yeah, like Jokaste didn’t ask for you to make a star out of her! They’re the same, using your kindness and your stupid crush on them to make you do whatever they want without actually asking for anything!”

“Don’t fucking compare Laurent to Jokaste. He’s nothing like her, do you hear me?”

He could feel the blood rushing through his ears, his vision blind with angriness. Jokaste never loved him, not even one bit, but Laurent understood him and liked him. He wasn’t using him! Sleeping with him wasn’t a good thing for him, it wouldn’t help him. He did it because he wanted to, not because he had to!

“Fine. They’re nothing alike,” Nikandros said. “But I’m telling you right now, Damen: this will end badly, and I won’t pick you up this time.”

“If that’s what you really want, I can’t stop you, can I?”

Nikandros seemed to be about to protest but he stopped himself at the last moment and simply nodded. He gathered his things and left without another word, leaving Damen alone with his angriness and his too many doubts.

He was laying down on his bed, Laurent using his chest as a pillow while Damen gently stroked his hair.

It had been three days since the fight with Nikandros, and though he stood firm on his position, he couldn’t help but feel the guilt eating him. Nikandros was wrong – there wasn’t any doubt in his mind about that- still, he was like a brother to him and not having him by his side was harder with each passing day.

“You still won’t tell me what is bothering you?” Laurent asked, pulling Damen away from his thoughts.

He wished he could, but he doubted Laurent would be pleased with the answer. He wasn’t completely sure of what was happening between them; if it was just sex or something more, but either way, admitting to him that his best friend compared him to the woman who almost ruined his life was far from a compliment.

“Nothing. Just thinking about the meeting with Halvik. She said she wanted to meet us on Monday instead of Friday.”

He felt Laurent freeze in his arms, his body becoming rigid under his touch. Perhaps Laurent was more anxious about the deal than he claimed to be.

“Oh. I see.”

“Are you nervous?”

“No.”

“You sure? Because you seem like you are,” Damen bit his lip before talking again. “Is it because of us?”

“What do you mean?” Laurent frowned and pushed himself to a sitting position.

“Well, there’s an obvious conflict of interest. If Halvik figures it out, she won’t sign the contract.”

“No, I’m not concerned about the contract.”

He lay down again, a sigh escaping his lips.

How could he not be concerned about the contract? The meeting with Halvik would be a critical point of his career. It would either make a star out of him or stick him to his internet corner forever.

He couldn’t understand why Laurent seemed so detached. He knew this wasn’t a confidence issue. More than once, Laurent assured him that he wouldn’t get the contract. He found it very odd, even more when he started getting to know Laurent better. Laurent’s self-esteem was better than his own; he knew he was talented, more than a lot of artists. He also knew that he was beautiful, two things that are generally enough to meet the agency’s criteria.

So why did he keep saying that he wouldn’t get signed?

“You said your family was in the music industry,” he started. “What were they doing, exactly?”

Laurent sighed again and turned around, his face only a few inches away from Damen’s. With his long hair loose against his naked body, barely covered by the sheet, he looked like he walked straight out of a magazine and Damen felt taken aback. God, sometimes he forgot how beautiful Laurent was.

“I’m naked on your bed, and you want to talk about my parents?” Laurent asked, one eyebrow raised.

Damen couldn’t resist, he tilted his head until he could drop a kiss on Laurent’s eyebrow.

“That’s better,” Laurent declared, his cheeks turning a light red like it did every time Damen would kiss him. “Now, stop thinking so much and enjoy the time we have left together.”

Damen frowned. The time they had left?

Before he was able to press for more, he found himself being pinned down by Laurent’s body as he straddled his stomach.

“Did I tell you that I took riding lessons for four years?”

No, he certainly didn’t.

Stress. He wasn’t gonna get consumed by stress, he knew it.

They were only a few minutes away from meeting with Halvik, and already Damen could feel his hands starting to sweat. He’d never been so nervous with an artist before, but this was Laurent, and he would be damned if it didn’t work out.

It would work out.

The song was amazing and so was Laurent.

He tried to push Nikkandros words out of his mind, but it wasn’t easy. He knew that something was off, even if he had tried to convince himself otherwise.

Was he making a mistake? He had made one with Jokaste in the past. He didn’t want to do it again.

“Stop bouncing your legs,” Laurent instructed him, his eyes glued on his phone.

There wasn’t any trace of stress on his face, nor on his body. He looked calm as ever, which only made Damen stress more.

“She’s ready to receive you,” Halvik’s secretary finally told them after what felt like an eternity.

Damen jumped out of his chair and started to walk towards the door, only to be stopped by Laurent’s hand.

All the coldness that Damen knew too well had left Laurent’s face. Instead, he looked off, even a little sad, maybe. Why would he be sad?

“Whatever is said in there, just know that everything was real between us.”

“What do you mean?” he frowned; his heart pounding even harder in his chest.

If Laurent had wanted to answer, he didn’t have the time, the door of the office already opening. Halvik wasn’t smiling. She was looking down, her jaw clenched, and Damen couldn’t understand if she was angry or sad. What was up with everybody? What did they know that he didn’t?

“Damen, Laurent, please sit down,” she instructed them. They did so, Damen’s heart threatening to rip out of his chest at any moment. He quickly wondered if they could hear it since it was beating so hard. “I’m gonna be honest and direct. The song is amazing, Laurent sounds like a debauched angel and you both did a more than perfect work.”

Damen couldn’t help but smile, his anxiety disappearing almost immediately, only to come back stronger when he turned towards Laurent. He still didn’t look happy and neither did Halvik.

“But we can’t have you in our company, Laurent. I think you already know that.”

“I do,” Laurent said nonchalantly.

“What? Why?” Damen frowned. If everything was perfect, why couldn’t they sign the contract?

“Because Laurent’s uncle is the owner of De Vere Record Industry, which means that he owns almost every radio station, and record company, including us, and he has strictly indicated that he doesn’t want his nephew to sign any contracts with us.”

Synapses were fusing in Damen’s mind as he tried to understand what was being said. De Vere. Laurent De Vere. That was what Laurent meant when he said that his family was in the music industry. They owned the biggest music company in America!

Why would he keep that a secret? And why would his uncle refuse to promote him? Nothing made sense.

“I don’t understand,” he said. “Why wouldn’t he want Laurent to be successful? Not only is he family, but his talent could make him even richer!”

“Well,” Halvik shifted awkwardly on her chair and she looked over Laurent, who simply looked back at her, his jaw clenched. He already seemed to know what she was about to say. “He claimed that Laurent has… mental issues.”

Laurent chuckled.

“What about the song?” he asked.

“Your uncle said he will allow you to release it. We will still own a part of it, but most of the incomes will go to you,” Halvik smiled. “It’s a really nice gesture from him, you know? He must love you very much.”

Laurent’s face turned red with anger, but he smirked.

“Oh, I have no doubt about that.”

Damen was having too much trouble understanding what was happening to say anything.

Halvik told them that they could leave and that she would talk to Damen later, apparently having understood that now wasn’t the right time to do so.

The next hours were a total mystery for Damen. He let his body guide him on autopilot, his mind was completely gone. He remembered walking out of the office and Laurent leaving him without even saying goodbye. Then he was driving home and collapsing in his bed, his head dizzy from all that happened.

Laurent had played him.

He didn’t know why, didn’t know what his motivation was, but the facts were there: he had been played, again.

Maybe Laurent simply wanted payback for Damen’s hounding of him in the beginning? Maybe he just thought it would be funny, to make Damen work so hard for exactly nothing?

He had his song, now. Nikandros had been right. It was Laurent’s song, not his anymore. Maybe his name will appear somewhere, but he wasn’t even sure. For all he knew, Laurent could do whatever pleased him with his work.

Was their relation part of his ‘joke’, too?

It had seemed real when they were kissing.

It had seemed real, when Laurent was screaming his name, his nails digging deep into his back as he reached orgasm, Damen’s cock deep inside of him.

It had seemed real, when they lay in bed, skin on skin, Laurent smiling and tracing hearts all over him with his fingertip.

It had seemed real when they cuddled together and watched a movie, when they talked until four in the morning and when Laurent told him that he felt whole with him.

It had seemed real but it never had been, and Damen had no one left to pick him up, now.


	5. Chapter 5

Someone was knocking on his door. This person, whoever it was, must have been determined considering that they had been doing so for at least half an hour now.

Damen still hadn’t moved from his bed.

He didn’t feel like it. He wouldn’t have the patience to deal with whoever was behind the door and he couldn’t risk going to jail for beating someone up out of anger.

This time, a rock landed against his window.

He frowned and finally got up, ready to face his stalker.

He was surprised to see Nikandros, who looked almost as pissed as he did.

“Nik?” he said, dumbfounded.

“Dude, I’ve been knocking like crazy for half an hour! I had to climb your fucking gate!”

“Why didn’t you use your keys?”

“Because I left them here last time I came over,” he sighed. “Can you open the door now, please?”

“Oh, yeah, of course.”

He quickly put on a pair of pants and ran towards the door, ready to apologize. He owed Nikandros a huge apology.

“I’m sorry,” Nikandros said before he could even open his mouth. “I should have come sooner, but I was still pissed, and I had things to figure out before talking to you.”

“I don’t- I’m the one who should be sorry!” he sighed, shame washing over him. “You were right about Laurent. He never… he used me. Like Jokaste did. I shouldn’t... I shouldn’t have talked to you like that. I fucked everything up, again.”

Next thing he knew, he was being pulled into a tight hug, Nikandros’s arms encircling him.

“I’m sorry you had to go through this again,” he whispered. “But I wasn’t right. Well, I don’t think I was, at least.”

“What do you mean?”

Nikandros broke the hug and guided Damen towards the living room. He sat down the table and opened his laptop, excitement apparent on his face.

“Halvik called me and she told me everything. She said she was concerned and wanted me to check on you, but I didn't want to. I wanted to make you understand that I was right and that you couldn't blame anyone else but yourself." 

"Lesson learned," Damen mumbled. 

"Wait, because that's not it. I wanted to wait until Laurent published the song, but he didn't. It's been what, a week? He's had plenty of time to do it, but he hasn't. He hasn't posted anything for weeks now. It didn't make any sense; he pratically owns the song now, why wouldn't he release it?" 

"I don't know, maybe he's trying to get some radio station to play it?" 

“See, that’s another issue. He won’t be able to get radio airtime for the song, because his uncle has contracts with basically every station. So, I thought, what was he getting out of all that? The answer is nothing. There isn’t any explanation as to why he would record a song with you, apart from the fact that he truly wanted to do so.”

“Or maybe he thought it would be funny to humiliate me? I don’t know, Nik. His uncle said he has mental issues. I don’t think there’s anything deeper than that.”

“Yeah, that’s what Halvik told me too," he turned his laptop towards Damen. "So, I did some digging. Laurent and his brother started living with their uncle after their parents died in a car crash. Apparently, there was an issue with the car, but the details were never released. Then, a few years later, Auguste dies. In a car accident, after the car had an issue."

"People die in car accidents every day."

"They do, that's for sure. But Auguste was fighting to get custody of Laurent, whow asn't eigtheen yet. I had to dig a lot to find all that info because any traces of Auguste and laurent had been deleted from the internet.E ven when you go to their parent's Wikipedia page, you can't find them!"

"That's strange," Damen admitted. 

"It is. But wait, because it only goes weird. See, Auguste was apparently claiming that his uncle was abusive towards Laurent. They don't go into details, but apparently, there was enough evidence for him to win. Their parents were also fighting with the uncle. Apparently, his brother wanted him out of the company too. It had something to do with "exhanges" made between some parents and kids." 

"Why did we never hear of it?" he asked, a feelong of disgust washing over him. He remembered Halvik's words, "he must love you very much", and he felt himself getting sick. 

"Because his brother died and he was the one in charge until Augiste and Laurent reached age twenty-one, but Auguste died before that. The kids under his tutelage disappeared from public view after puberty, most have their name blacklisted and some even died. The uncle then claimed Laurent had mental issues and while it wasn't medically proven, some of their uncle's friends claimed they witness some of his "episodes". They all got promotions in the following years."

"He bought them,"

"You tell me, you're the one whos pent weeks with Laurent. Did he act weird?"

"No, not at all." 

"That's what I thought too," Nikandros admitted. 

"So what do we do now? Even if I successfully reach Laurent and I tell him everything we know, we won't be able to get him a contract. His uncle owns everything."

"Well," Nikandros began, "Not Eveerything. Your father's comapny has some exclusives and influences over radio stations."

"My brother's company."

"Yeah, your brother, who apparently fired more than half the company and who's in so much debut that he's about to lose his house."

"What?" 

Nikandris nodded and smiled. 

"It isn't public information yet, but I know someone on the inside who told me. According to him, your brother would give the company to anyone who wants it." 

"So all I have to do is to go see him, pretend that I don't know a thing and try to buy it back," he said, coming up with a plan at the same time. 

"Exactly. Plus, I know they all want you back," Nikandris said with a soft smile on his face. "You were their boss, even before your dad got sick. You didn't have the title, but you never needed one." 

He smiled back, his throat too tight for him to talk and put his hand on top of Nikandros', his heart heavy with emotions. 

"Come on, enough with crying. We've got a lot to do," Nikandros declared. 

Damen agreeed and together, they started to come up with a plan. Chances were good that it wouldn't work. There were too many ways it could get fucked up, too many factors to take into account, but they still had to try. 

“ _Whatever is said in there, just know that everything was real between us.”_

Even if he couldn’t win back his father’s company, he would win Laurent back, he promised himself that.

He sent a text to Laurent the next morning, asking him to come and see him. When a few hours went by and Laurent still hadn’t answered, he had no other choice but to claim that he wanted the t-shirt Laurent had borrowed – or more likely stole- from him back.

Half an hour later, Laurent was on his doorstep, a cold expression on his face as he handed him the shirt.

Without a word, he turned around, ready to leave.

“Wait!” Damen yelled after him. “Come inside, please. I want to talk to you.”

“I have nothing to tell you.”

“Yeah well, I do,” he said. “Come on Laurent, you owe me that, don’t you think?”

Laurent clenched his jaw but nodded, knowing full well that he couldn’t win this argument.

They went inside and Damen told him everything, from the way he was going to win back his company to the information Nik had found about his uncle. He left the part where they discovered that Laurent was one of his uncle’s many victims, knowing that Laurent probably preferred for him not to know it.

Laurent didn’t say anything at first, and when a few minutes went by without him talking, Damen pressed him.

“Say something.”

“Let me get this straight,” Laurent said. “You want to pay for a company in bankruptcy?”

“Yeah.”

“And you think you will be making a great deal?”

“The finances aren’t that bad, Kastor is just really stupid.”

That had the merit of getting a smile out of Laurent, at least.

“I’m happy for you, Damen. You deserve it.”

“You’re not gonna say anything concerning your uncle?”

“I don’t see what I could say. I’m… touched, that you believe me over him, but I’m not sure it will change a thing.”

“It changes that now I know for sure that what we had was real.”

“I’ve told you that,” Laurent said, blushing furiously. He missed this so much.

“Yes, but there’s so much you didn’t tell, I didn’t… I couldn’t tell what was true or not.”

“But you can, now?”

“Yes.”

They looked at each other for a moment without saying anything. The truth was, Damen wasn’t sure Laurent would agree to go back to whatever they were before. It hadn’t lasted long, barely a week, and he couldn’t say they started off the right way, but he knew there was potential. He knew, deep down, that if Laurent gave them a chance, he wouldn’t leave his side ever again.

“My uncle will do everything he can to destroy you if he finds out about us.”

“He can go fuck himself,” Damen said. “I’m not scared of him and neither are you; otherwise you wouldn’t have agreed to record a song with me in the first place.”

“What if it doesn’t work? You’ll be left without money and fame, all that because of me.”

“I’m willing to take the risk if you are.”

Laurent hesitated a moment before speaking up again. “I don’t care about money or fame if it means making my uncle pay.”

“Neither do I.”

He smiled.

“What do you want us to do, then?”

“I want us to fight back and make your uncle pay.”

“Believe me, I want that as much as you do. Probably even more, but if there was any way to do so, I would already have done it.”

“Yes, but you were alone and now we’re together. We have Nik, too.”

“Nikandros hates me,” he pointed out.

“No, not anymore.”

Laurent hesitated for a moment before sighing.

“What would the plan be?”

Damen couldn’t help his smile and, without giving it a second thought, took Laurent’s hand in his and dropped a kiss on it, making Laurent blush again.

“We should release the song we’ve written together first, see how people react to it. Then another one, so we could grow a fanbase. I think there’s a chance your uncle will try to take our song down, once he discovered that we’re working together.”

“It won’t work, have you seen how long it took us to write the first song? We don’t have that kind of time.”

“Yes, but it will be different, this time. I know you and you know me. It will be easier,” he promised. “I’ve already started working on a melody.”

He walked to the piano and started playing it before Laurent could say anything. The melody had come to him after their meeting with Halvik when his feelings towards Laurent were still raw from betrayal and sadness. Then, once Nikandros had told him the truth, he had written the second part of the melody, putting into it as much faith and hope as he could, a perfect contrast with the beginning.

“What do you think?” he asked after hitting the final note.

“It’s beautiful,” Laurent’s voice was rough and different emotions that Damen couldn’t quite place were passing on his face. “That melody… does it have lyrics, yet?”

“No, I didn’t get that far,” he admitted.

“I would like to do it if that’s alright with you.”

He was surprised by the offer. He had not expected Laurent to want to write the lyrics, not when the melody was clearly made for something personal. It held a lot of emotions and he knew that Laurent wasn’t the best when it came to deal with it. Still, he agreed.

“I have something to tell you, before…” Laurent said. “It’s about my childhood with my uncle.”

He felt his body freeze. It was the part of the conversation he had feared the most. He hadn’t been sure they would talk about it, if he was honest, he thought Laurent wouldn’t mention it at all. But here they were and if Laurent wanted to talk, he would be there to listen.

So, Laurent started. He talked about Auguste and his death, about what his uncle did to him and to all the other kids and Damen did his best to keep all his emotions off his face so Laurent wouldn’t have to see all the disgust, sadness, and angriness that were coursing through him. If Laurent was able to keep a perfectly stoic face when talking about his childhood trauma, then he would be able to do it, too.

“Are you disgusted?” Laurent asked.

“What?” That isn’t what he had expected him to ask. “I- yes, of course. What your uncle did is awful, how could I not be?”

“No, that’s not what I meant. Are you disgusted by me?”

“Of course not,” he said, dumbfounded. How could he ever be disgusted with him? “Disgusting is not even close on the list of words I would use to describe you.”

Laurent nodded, apparently satisfied with the answer. Sometimes, he wished he could carve into his head and figure out what he was thinking, what was hiding behind this wall of coldness.

“Tell me more about your plan,” Laurent asked.

“I was thinking about reveling your face and identity if that’s alright with you.”

He thought about it for a moment before nodding. “You want me to show him that I’m not afraid of him anymore by revealing myself.”

“That was the plan, yes, but if you don’t want to, we will find another way.”

“He’ll take my channel down if I do that.”

“Maybe, but he won’t be able to take mine,” Damen pointed out. “And I don’t think he’ll be able to take yours either. The song won’t directly call him out, but it will scare him. I hope it will be a wake-up call for a lot of victims to come out. Not just your uncle’s victim, but all victims in the music industry.”

“You want to start a movement?”

“Yeah, sort of. Your uncle is a piece of shit but he’s not the only one.”

“You’re talking about exposing a lot of powerful men, Damen,” he carefully said. “They will shut us down as soon as it gets out. Plus, you can’t relate to the victims about speaking up. Most of them already did, and they were shut down.”

“I know, but I’ve already contacted some of them who agreed to testify.”

Laurent rubbed his face as he took every aspect into consideration. This was risky and they both knew it. His parents had tried to act against his uncle and they were killed. The same went for his brother. The thing was, he had already killed Laurent, too. No one remembered him, no one knew him, and he couldn’t even do what he loved without his uncle getting in his way. It was his chance to have a career and a real life.

“Did you write the song already? Because I would like to help you write it.”

They released “Give Me His Shadow” and as Damen expected, everybody loved it. Laurent went from 1 million subscribers to almost 2 million in less than a few days, much to Damen’s delight.

According to Laurent, his uncle must have not expected for Damen – or anyone, really- to promote the song, considering that because of Laurent, Imagine Record had lost not only time but also a song that could easily have become a hit song. He certainly didn’t expect Damen of all people to promote him.

“Which picture should I use?” Laurent asked his head on Damen’s shoulder.

Once the awkwardness of getting back together went away, Damen had the pleasure to discover that despite what he first thought Laurent was very affectionate.

Currently, that meant lying down on top of Damen’s body on the sofa, his head resting on his shoulder while the rest of his body was on him, using him as a giant pillow.

Damen absolutely loved it.

“Let’s see what you’ve got.”

He took Laurent’s phone in his hands and started scrolling through the pictures. He didn’t have a lot of pictures of himself, only the few he had sent to Damen’s over the past few weeks, and while he was incredibly beautiful on all of them, it wasn’t quite what Damen was looking for.

“You’re beautiful,” he said. “Do you realize that?”

“Of course, I have eyes, you know.”

“And so humble,” he laughed. “These pics are amazing, but I think I’ve got some better on my phone.”

He handed his phone to Laurent, and they started scrolling on it. Contrary to Laurent, Damen had a habit of taking pictures of everything, whether it was his food, his new car, Nikandros and, of course, Laurent.

“Stalker,” Laurent whispered.

“You’re definitely posing in most of them.”

“Whatever,” Laurent said, rolling his eyes. Damen could have bought it if there hadn’t been a smile on his face as he did so. “I like this one.”

It was a picture of Laurent smiling, right after they finished recording. His hair was messy from having worked all day and his eyes shining with happiness. He had this look a lot, lately.

“I love it,” he said, stroking Laurent’s hair before kissing it.

Laurent smiled and turned his head so they could kiss properly before continuing his scrolling.

“So much food. How is it even possible?” Laurent complained. “I’m starting to think that you like food more than you like me.”

“Oh, that wouldn’t be possible, babe,” he said, hugging him closer. “Hey, get back to the previous one!”

“This one?” Laurent asked, scrolling back.

It was a picture of the two of them, heads against heads, a smile on their face. They looked in love and happy. Invincible, too.

The next photo was the same, except that instead of looking at the camera, they were kissing.

“I love these pictures.”

“Me too,” Laurent admitted. “You’re very… attractive.”

“Oh, am I?” he laughed, a feeling of pride filling him. Attractive. Laurent called him attractive! “Maybe we could use these two, too.”

Laurent frowned. “On Instagram?”

“Yeah.”

They hadn’t talked about that yet. It was a subject that both of them had chosen to ignore until now and that they tried not to think about. Announcing their relationship was risky for many reasons, but Damen knew that whether they officially announced it or not, people would eventually find out. May as well be on their own terms.

“We are very handsome on these,” Laurent said. “Fine, we will post them.”

“You’re jealous,” Laurent pointed out, smirking.

“No, I’m not.”

“You’re definitely are,” Nikandros butted in.

He had wrongly thought that nothing could be as bad as Nikandros and Laurent hating each other but having the two of them getting together against him was far worse.

He wasn’t jealous, so to speak. They had revealed Laurent’s face and identity a few days ago now, and since then, Laurent’s Instagram was booming with love declarations, messages from admirers and, much to Damen’s frustration, explicit commentaries with Laurent as the main subject.

They hadn’t posted the pictures of them yet, deciding to wait a few days for things to calm down, and Damen simply couldn’t wait.

“Don’t worry,” Laurent told him, his hands coming to cup his face. “I’m not going anywhere.”

He smiled and pulled Laurent into a kiss, ignoring the sound of disgust coming from Nikandros.

“I would like to remind you that we have a song to record.”

They both rolled their eyes at him but eventually and without any help from Damen, Laurent finally broke the kiss and went back in the recording room.

The song had been hard to write, harder than what Damen thought it would be. It had triggered traumatic memories for Laurent, and more than once did he ask to stop only to isolate himself in a different room. The only thing Damen could do was giving him time and space to heal.

Ultimately, they were able to finish it and Damen wasn’t weighing his words when he said that it was a masterpiece. They went over all the topics, the pain, the grief, the manipulation, and betrayal, without being too raw, as Laurent had requested.

The song wasn’t making a victim out of Laurent, but a hero. He was taking his uncle down and winning back his life at the same time.

“If you don’t like it-“

“I’m gonna like it.”

“Yes, but if you don’t-“

“I’ll stab you if you don’t start already,” Laurent threatened.

Damen laughed but agreed and started kissing Laurent’s chest. He started by taking his nipples in his mouth, kissing them with as much passion as he would kiss Laurent’s mouth, before he shifted down, his tongue tracing over his abs.

“Come on, faster.”

“Bossy,” Damen playfully complained.

He licked over his bellybutton, which resulted in Laurent grasping the bedsheets, his breathing already accelerating.

Under him, he could feel Laurent’s cock already leaking, though still untouched. He was sure could make Laurent come from nothing but kisses.

Slowly, he parted Laurent’s legs and pushed them up until his most private place was revealed. Pink and tight, he admired the view for a few seconds before pressing his thumb to it.

It opened, beautiful and welcoming. He lowered himself and, after sparing one last look at Laurent’s face, gave his first lick over it.

He did it again, this time pressing his tongue in, and he saw Laurent’s face twisted in pleasure.

He applied more pressure and tried to get deeper, his hands holding his cheeks apart.

“Fuck, that’s good,” Laurent moaned, pushing his ass back against his tongue to get more friction.

Damen tried to give him just that, one of his hands letting go of its hold so he could slide one finger inside, which only made Laurent scream louder.

Laurent felt his whole body contracting and suddenly he was coming, the pleasure so incredible that his untouched cock wasn’t able to hold it back.

Damen couldn’t help but stare, incredible. He had his fair share of sexual experiences, more than a lot of people could claim to have, but he couldn’t remember ever being with someone as sensitive and expressive as Laurent.

He loved it.

He dropped a kiss over Laurent’s heart as he lay down next to him, Laurent slowly coming down from his orgasm.

“That was-“

“Adequate?” Damen teased him.

Laurent laughed and nodded before curling against Damen, not carrying about the mess he just made.

“Yes, adequate. You’re a very adequate boyfriend,” he whispered before sliding his hand down Damen’s body. “What if I show you how much of a good boyfriend I am, now?”

He had barely moved when the door of their room opened, reveling an all-smiling Nikandros, whose face turn down as soon as he realized what was in front of him.

“Shit, sorry!”

Damen hurried to cover themselves, Laurent apparently finding the situation too funny to do anything but laugh.

“Dude, you need to knock!” Damen complained. It wasn’t the first time Nikandros had walked on him – on them, even – having sex, but it never failed to embarrass him.

“Sorry! But it was an emergency!”

“What is it?” Laurent asked, more serious now.

“Can I come in?”

“Yes,” they both said.

Nikandros walked in and handle them his phone.

“People love it.”

The song. That was why they decided to go to their bedroom in the middle of the day: to forget about it and relax before the storm began.

“Memories for everything” already had 800,000 hits with the numbers still climbing. There were hundreds of comments too, and as they started to read, Damen’s hand instinctively found Laurent’s.

There were people applauding Laurent’s courage, some sharing their own stories, some simply admiring the beauty of the song. Some were speculating, too, about who this song was about, though most of them were already pointing in the same direction.

“What do we do, now?” Nikandros asked.

“We wait,” Laurent said.

They didn’t have to wait long. The next day, a young man made a post about how, during one of his auditions, Laurent’s uncle had tried to touch him, only stopping when his father walked into the room. He claimed that after he said no, Laurent’s uncle promised him that he would never get a contract in the music industry. He had thought it was an empty promise until every record agency turned their back on him.

Then, a thirty years old singer came out. He talked about the deal made between his parents and Laurent’s uncle, where he was used as a trade for fame. He talked about how it affected him, how there were days where he could barely look at himself, too disgusted with what had happened. He talked about his PTSD, his anxiety, his years of therapy and his constant fear.

A woman talked, too, about one of Laurent’s uncle’s associates. She was barely sixteen and when she tried to report him, she was told to keep it quiet.

Post after post, comments after comments, like after like, Damen realized that they had stepped into something bigger than he had expected.

Talking to Kastor was next on his list. He had thought long and hard about what he would say to him once they were face to face. He had dreamt of this moment for a long time now, but once he arrived in front of his brother, he realized he wasn’t angry at him anymore. Sure, Kastor had taken everything away from him – his father, his company, his girlfriend – but looking at his brother, he felt nothing but sadness for him. How low could he have thought of himself, if putting his anger on his little brother was his only solution? More than that, he had only had those things for a short period of time. Their business was going down, Jokaste had left him and their father was dead.

He proposed a great deal and Kastor hurried to agree, apparently having not expected such a generous offer. He claimed that he was giving it to him for nothing because he was oh so generous, and Damen pretended to agree.

The next day, he handed his resignation to Halvik, who simply smiled.

“You’re not surprised?” he asked.

“Oh, I’m surprised you stayed this long! You’re a leader, not a follower. I felt like I was killing you every time I gave you directives.”

“So, we’re good, right?”

“Yes,” she smiled. “But we’re competition now, so please get your ass out of my office.”

“Alright,” he laughed. “Thanks a lot, Halvik, I won’t forget what you did.”

“I hope so,” she said. “And Damen? If there’s a song that you want to buy back from us, let’s say something sang by a… uh… pretty face with eyelashes like a cow, I will make you an offer.”

“A friendly one?”

“Hell no, you’re gonna have to pay big time for it! Do you think I’m stupid?”

He laughed again and thanked her before leaving her office.

“What do you think?” Damen asked after reading the letter Laurent received.

It was a letter from his uncle, asking him to clear his name in exchange for a partnership. Laurent would have fifty percent of the company that was rightfully his, and in exchange, he would claim that the abuses weren’t from his uncle but from someone unrelated to him.

“I think that he’s scared. That’s pretty obvious. He wouldn’t have offered me a deal otherwise,” he sighed and turned towards him. “If I take him to court and I win, I’ll get my parent’s company back. But if I lose… I’ll lose it for good, and you’ll get hurt too. Chances are neither of us will be able to do music anymore.”

“I’m willing to take the risk if you are,” Damen assured him.

Laurent smiled softly and took his hand in his before kissing him.

“My uncle is a very smart man, but he could never have predicted this.”

“You standing up against him?”

“No, me not being alone.”


End file.
